FOOTNOTES:
[B] In "Gilbert Gurney," Hook makes Daly say, "I am the man; I did it; for originality of thought and design, I do think that was perfect."
[C] Mr. Barham has a confused account of this incident. He was not present on the occasion, as I was, standing close by the piano when it occurred.
[D] His biographer does not seem aware that for several months before he became editor of the "New Monthly" he wrote the "Monthly Commentary" for that magazine,—a pleasant, piquant, and sometimes severe series of comments on the leading topics or events of the month.
[E] Mr. Peake, the dramatist, who wrote most of the "Mathews at Home," attributes this epitaph to John Hardwicke. Lockhart gives it to Hook. Hook pictures Beazley in "Gilbert Gurney":—"His conversation was full of droll conceits, mixed with a considerable degree of superior talent, and the strongest evidence of general acquirements and accomplishments."
[F] "He was plump, short, with an intelligent countenance, and near-sighted, with, a constitution and complexion fresh enough to look forty, when I believed him to be at least four times that age."—Gilbert Gurney.
[G] He played a practical joke upon the actors of the Brighton Theatre, who were defective of a letter in their dialogue, by sending to them a packet, containing, on cards of various sizes, the letter H.
[H] While on his death-bed, Sir Robert Peel sent him a sum of money, probably not the first. It arrived in time to pay his funeral expenses. In September, 1842, a subscription was made for the widow and children of Dr. Maginn,—Dr. Giffard (then editor of the "Standard") and Lockhart being trustees in England, the Bishop of Cork and the Provost of Trinity College, Dublin, in Ireland, and Professor Wilson in Scotland. The card that was issued said truly,—"No one ever listened to Maginn's conversation, or perused even the hastiest of his minor writings, without feeling the interest of very extraordinary talent; his classical learning was profound and accurate; his mastery of modern languages almost unrivalled; his knowledge of mankind and their affairs great and multifarious"; but it did not state truly, that, "in all his essays, verse or prose, serious or comic, he never trespassed against decorum or sound morals," or that "the keenness of his wit was combined with such playfulness of fancy, good-humor, and kindness of natural sentiment, that his merits were ungrudgingly acknowledged even by those of politics most different from his own."